Katie is entertaining Chubba by playing music and dancing.
Surprise Mom!
Katie doing her infamous "bunny run" pose.
Jackson - uh mom...can you please get me out?
Jackson: Can you quit putting toys and books in my bed? I like to keep things neat.
This is sign language for "get me out NOW".
Grammy surprised the kiddos with a trip up to Okie to visit. She came early so she could see Collin's performance. Grammy and Katie enjoying the show.
Collin is wrapping up his 3rd year of drama classes. Wow - this is hard to believe! This session they worked on the tall tale about Sal Fink. Personally, I've never heard of the girl. Here he is playing the part of the crocodile.
And Collin played a fierce lightning bolt.
And finally a pirate. He was thrilled that his teacher selected him to have 3 parts with 3 costume changes during the show!
We spent Saturday morning showing Grammy around the Science Museum while Matt attended a thrilling conference about researching/writing/publishing. Luckily Katie never said anything about my mom knowing nothing about science. Reminder: my mom = science teacher extrodinaire.
Going through the mirror maze.
My mom must be in some kind of wierd science teacher/grandparent heaven here: showing her grandkids the Pythagorean Theorum. She did tell me that the exhibit wasn't actually made correctly. I intend to tell the science museum next time I'm there...without my mom...so maybe they will think I am that smart.
Riding the segways.
That blur on your left is Katie. Grammy - come again soon. We love all the attention you shower on us. And Matt and I loved our date. And thank you for cutting up my chickens and volunteering to help me clean and do laundry - only a Mommy.
Here is our little princess.
Notice: the Cinderella princess dress OVER the clothes she wore to school today and with tennis shoes. Last year she wanted to wear her Sleeping Beauty dress with her shin guards and soccer shoes. That is our Kate!
Even though our Kate does not really like princess stuff, she sure does like the Sweetheart Princess Tea. I honestly think it's just time alone with The Dad that she likes.
Yes, those are shot gun shells on the cake. I should have taken a picture of the camo on the side of the cake...it was fabulously decorated!
Happy 8th to Collin and happy 69th to Pops! Don't really know if Pops wants me to announce that but I might be safe since he is not a computer user.
I am tweaking a title of a series of lessons given by our preacher: Two births that changed the world - February 20. We have been lucky enough to celebrate all but 1 of the 8 years together! We love sharing the special day!
Our Collin sure does like Harry Potter. For the 2nd year in a row he has had a Harry Potter party, he dressed as him for Halloween, he has read (with me) the first 3 books and has seen the first 3 movies. He is now on his mission to have all of the currently-on-the-market HP Lego sets...just one more to go and he wants to ask Santa for it because "it costs a lot of money and I don't want you and dad to have to pay for it."
Sister is thrilled that it is someone else's special day.
I would like to publically announce that I was able to hide this bike in our car from home to Post, TX. Aren't I sneaky?
Collin, cousin Caleb, Jackson and Katie. Caleb and Jackson are 9 months apart...can't you tell?
Pops and Jarre with 4 of the 11 grandkids.
Thankfully Collin took over the job of pushing Jackson around on his truck. My back and legs were hurting!!
Round and round and round and round and round through the living room and kitchen, we made a figure 8 over and over and over again. I'm exhausted just posting this.
A New Year's Resolution for 2011: Have a family devotional time weekly, not sporadically. And after a great review by our elementary children's directors from church, we settled on this Bible to help guide our way. We are currently following the "short path" for families with kids 9 and under. Doing a weekly devotional time has led to great family singing, good questions, good thinking, taking prayer requests and saying prayers and excellent conversation with our 2 oldest kids. Jackson is still at the crawl-around-and-play during our devotional but he does stop and stare at us when we start to sing.
Sorry...do not know how to delete a picture from my blog, nor do I know how to turn a picture.
I will officially begin scrapbooking our Europe 2009 trip this weekend. I'm excited. While getting some pictures in order for the big scrap and after talking to my dear friend who is in England right now, I decided to post a little of our fun. Here a beautiful waterfall coming from the middle of the mountain.
Our family went to Switzerland during our free travel at the end of our 6 weeks with the college students. Beautiful. I can still kind of taste and smell the fresh, clean air.
Katie (3 1/2) and Collin (6) on the steps waiting for the bus to take us to the Open Air Museum.
The same water picture...I guess I really like this one.
A roof made entirely of grass/hay. Awesome!
Katie is practicing her hammering skills in the kids section of the museum.
Collin is also practicing his hammering skills.
Here the kiddos got to try on some period clothing. Isn't she a little cutie? Katie remembers that this outfit was itchy.
Here is shepherd Collin and Heidi Katie.
After a long hike to the other side of the museum, after Katie falling down a steep hill, after Mommy stopping every so often to ask WHY we are climbing mountains in Switzerland when I am 6 months pregnant (that was Jackson talking, I totally enjoyed it), we made it to the OTHER kids section and we sprung for a merry go round ride.
The sweaty cuties.
Katie and Collin got to pet some goats. She loved the fact that they all had bells around their necks and wanted to ring them all.
Katie picking some grass to feed to the goats. Collin also was picking grass to feed the goats and I guess grabbed some stinging nettle things that were on the other side of the fence. His hand swelled up and had little red dots all over it. We found a watering trough to wash it in. Found a bathroom to wash him up with soap and then later dosed him up with Benadryl. He still remembers grabbing the stinging nettles.
